Free vouchers scam on Facebook warning

We’ve just had some information sent to us about Argos vouchers being given away on Facebook and I’ve just seen an identical scam offering Boots vouchers being posted in a local Facebook group.

If you see people posting things like the two examples below, they are scams, you should not click any links, these will take you to a website that will ask you for personal information, under the pretence of being able to post the vouchers to you. The website may also try to download malicious code to your computer.

The domains being used end in .xyz and will take you to a page like this

Where you will be asked to share the post on Facebook and in any groups you are a member of. It seems that you have to share the post on your own timeline and then to 5 groups before you can proceed to the next step. This makes it harder for the posts to get deleted and helps them propagate further. The domain name changes every time someone shares a post but always ends in .xyz

If you see any of your friends posting links to free vouchers, please let them know it is a scam and ask them to delete the post and also to check any groups they are members of and to delete their posts in those as well.

The offer of vouchers and gift cards are regularly used by scammers to try and get people to provide personal details and information. They will ask for your address to enable them to post the vouchers or cards to you and in many cases will ask for some kind of payment, often less than £5 to cover postage. Making a payment to the scammers could give the scammers access to your bank account to withdraw more funds from you.

Updated at 14:10 to include the Boots vouchers.

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